


Still Breathing

by HollsteinFF



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dark, F/F, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-14
Updated: 2017-10-14
Packaged: 2019-01-17 10:44:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12363987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HollsteinFF/pseuds/HollsteinFF
Summary: Hermione's time with Bellatrix. Was it all torture? Or was it something else?





	Still Breathing

Hermione Granger was still breathing. It was not from lack of trying. Bellatrix had sharpened her tongue until her lips were spitting razorblades. Calculated insults carefully designed to cut straight through flesh and bone had rolled off of her cold tongue in waves of animosity. The Death-Eater had watched as her harsh words shredded the Gryffindor’s outer defenses and made jagged the edges of the girl’s very soul.

She had watched as brunette stood tall, puffed in pride, as blow after ruthless blow hit the witch square in the chest, teasing the fringes of the girl’s self-worth. Hermione’s heart was still beating, but Bellatrix had watched as her verbal assault drained the color from the girl’s face, the shine from those bright eyes, and the life from those muddy veins. Hermione Granger was still breathing, but no one could say that the girl was alive.

It had taken the Death-Eater awhile to determine how to break the girl, but the task had been given to her so graciously by the Dark Lord, Harrod, that she would not let him down. Bellatrix would break the mudblood. She would drain the girl of information, and then she would take Hermione’s life.

At first she had attempted torture. Pain had had no lasting effect on the Gryffindor, aside from the joy that swelled in Bellatrix’s own heart at hearing the cries of agony. She had held a mirror up to the brunette’s face after the third day of torture. “Even if you make it out of this alive,” she had hissed, “no one will want you now. No one will ever look at you and see beauty, not like I do. They’ll know that you have been tainted. Pain has licked at the edges of your soul and has tasted the onset of apathy. You will never know love from anyone but me.” The dark witch had cradled the girl’s face in her hand. She would make the child beg for her, for death, until when she pointed her blade at the girl, Hermione would feel nothing but gratitude when the Death-Eater finally plunged the cold steel into the muscle that would put an end to all of the girl’s suffering.

* * *

Hermione Granger was still breathing. This fact was made certain when the girl had finally looked into the mirror that Bellatrix held.

The brunette’s breath had caught in her throat and was released in a strangled cry. Hermione’s face had hardened upon seeing her own reflection. Dried blood caked around her nose, her eyes, her ears. There was a gash in her forehead, where her marble skin met her dark, unkempt hair.

In Bellatrix’s impatience, she had struck the girl with the back of her hand slicing the soft skin open with the silver snake coiled around her middle finger.

The Gryffindor’s hair had been matted with blood and sweat and it had clung to her face and neck in dark clumps. She had panted, fallen to her knees, clutching her heart. Tears had formed in her eyes though Bellatrix could tell that the girl was trying hard to will them away.

The memory was so clear, as if just hours ago Hermione was writhing under the dark witch’s blade, screaming. Somewhere in the eight days that the girl had been under Bellatrix’s _care,_ brown eyes had faded from shining bright with defiance. They had darkened with lust, pupils dilated, as the girl’s pain had turned into pleasure. The Death-Eater had not expected this. That was when she knew that this girl would not break with mere physical torture. Hermione was strong, zealous. The girl still had something to live for, keeping her fighting. If Bellatrix was going to break the mudblood, she was going to have to take that away.

She couldn’t take away the girl’s real friends or family – they were untouchable – but she could be very persuasive when she wanted to be. She could make the brunette believe there was nothing to live for. She could find the witch’s weaknesses. She could put cracks in the girl’s foundation and slither through like water until she could break Hermione apart from the inside. And she did.

Bellatrix stood looking into her own mirror. Her skin was still flawless, her dark eyes still slightly sunken from years of sleepless nights in Azkaban, nights that she would never be able to get back. Her hair still cascaded down her back in thick, dark waves. She smiled to myself, a smile that, she had to admit, even in her later years, could strike fear in the hearts of the innocent. Not that there was any innocence left. Voldemort, after his triumph, had made sure to rid the world of that annoyance. She had been the key to His triumph.

Hermione’s lips had been dripping with secrets. In the end, all Bellatrix had to do was feign allegiance to the girl. Make the brunette believe that she would never be alone. That had been the Gryffindor’s weakness, her greatest fear, loneliness. The Death-Eater had slipped into the girl’s soul through chapped, parted lips. Unleashed her plan in a kiss, a kiss that had planted the seed of doubt on Hermione’s tongue. The girl had swallowed greedily in her attempts to keep their mouths attached, a seed that had taken deep within the witch, sprouting tendrils that had grown to fill every fracture in her soul.

Those vines had filled Hermione so completely. Had filled her with…lust? Lust had seemed to seep from the girl’s pores with her sweat, clinging to the roots of her hair, pooling in the hollow of her neck, dripping from the tip of her nose and chin. It had collected on her eyelashes and splashed down to the floor each time she blinked. It had been intoxicating. The air around her had been thick with the heady scent of her arousal. Her senses had been so heightened by days of torture that her nerves were screaming to be touched. Bellatrix had set down my blade, planning the next stages of Hermione’s torment.  

The Death-Eater remembered sauntering up to the broken girl; the heavy swing of her hips had always been one of her best features. Dark eyes on had been locked on her gait like a tigress stalking its prey. Hermione had looked hungry and unrestrained as the dark witch’s fingers ghosted over the buttons of the girl’s blouse. Bellatrix’s lips had been on the girl’s skin in seconds. Her hungry mouth had devoured the flesh, kissing a sharp jaw line, teeth tearing at the skin of a soft neck. She was not a gentle companion, but as she looked back on it, she didn’t think the girl was looking for gentle.

Bellatrix’s fingers had thrust inside of the Gryffindor until blood ran down the girl’s thighs; still the girl had screamed for more. Climax after climax had shaken her small body until the trembling had turned into a constant, something they both had grown used to. The Death-Eater had pushed sincerity into her eyes as she delivered her final blow. The three words that she knew would send the girl over the edge.

In the end, Hermione’s secrets had drained from the girl’s body in the sweat seeping from her pores, the blood and cum dripping down her thighs, even in the sighs and moans escaping her lips.

Bellatrix had gotten what she had came for. She had cast the girl aside then, her lips spewing insults, even laughing at the girl’s naivety. “No one could ever love filth like you _,_ ” she remembered saying. 

She had watched as Hermione’s heart broke as the realization of what had happened hit the girl full force. It was more beautiful than anything words could ever describe. Those chocolate eyes had filled with tears of betrayal, of shame, and there was a glint of something that Bellatrix still couldn’t quite, to the day, put her finger on. She didn’t kill the girl that day. She had left the mudblood there broken and used, to be found by the girl’s friends. Hermione Granger would never pose a threat to the Dark Lord again, not as she was.

* * *

Watching her friends and family die in the end had only broken Hermione further, put more cracks in her already shattered soul.

So Hermione’s heart still beats. The girl still wakes up every morning, and goes to bed every night. Bellatrix at times wondered what the girl was doing, what she was thinking. The few times the Death-Eater had indulged in checking up on the Gryffindor, her heart had been overcome with joy. The brunette still ate her meals, and still read her books. But, the witch was a shell. Hollow in every sense of the word. The once bright stare was now vacant, almost as if the girl was waiting on something, someone. Perhaps the brunette was still waiting for Bellatrix, to come and make good on all of her promises. Yes, Hermione Granger was still breathing, but no one could say that she was alive.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me here:
> 
> HollsteinFF  
> @H0llst3inFF  
> http://hollsteinFF.tumblr.com


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